Zugzwang

The necessary move that made everything weird.

Lessons from a weeklong shoot:

• Realizing ones full creative vision is never easy but it sure helps to have a competent tech person who can be coerced into believing; and enthusiastic performers who trust your direction, intuitively understanding that it is in the directors best interest for everyone to look good on scene. 

• Particularly at this stage of education, describing the proverbial proportionality between effort and result is ludicrous, yet this still must be done. When the plebs whinge it is necessary to remind ones self of the limitations faced by those lacking in artistry and imagination. The culture of immediate gratification does not help. There are those who would pick a microwave pop-tart over the wonder of a cloud-light soufflé in the name of convenience.   

• Diva behaviour is earned. If you have the capacity and talent, it may be forgivable. If you are a donkey masquerading as a gazelle, please shut up and just listen to the directions given.

Hours of axing, experimenting with song transitions, story-boarding and playing hooky to get the right lighting for scenes, surely it will amount to something? Many toes were stepped on but ruthless efficiency is required in producing quality within a limited time-frame. Please do not expect your arse to be buttered and have a good day. Shooting wrapped and now the grueling editing process is underway. In our techies we trust!

I am a research slut.

Time to commit to one field and knuckle down to a specific area to work in.

Your work ethic sucks.

It makes it hard to respect you as a colleague and it is probably why you aren't doing as well as you think you ought to.

The best of intentions vs reality.

Plan: Go to the gym. Treadmill. Lunges. Squats? otherexerciseythings?
What I did: Bought cake. Ate cake.
On the plus side, I walked to buy it.

Narcissim

I'd totally shag male me.

Making up for lost time.

Because I never did things in the right order.
Spending ones late teens and early twenties subsisting in a state of existential nihilism is a big waste of time. I know that time machines were not made within my lifetime because I would have gone to 18 year old me (conundrums for past/present/future self aside), given me a good shake and said "stop wasting your time, live, Live, LIVE! All this pondering and internal stewing will not serve you better than exploring life externally as well. Get out of this room, pull on these shoes and go forth!"

I need to walk so far it will be too tiring to get back, to read to the point that words are being recognized but not understood, to look directly into someones eyes and smile, to laugh until my ribs ache, to make love under the stars, to watch the sun rise over a horizon untouched by habitation and to liberate the reverberating rage threatening to seep between the cracks; a festering and pullulating mass, lest it find release in a tumultuous -and potentially regrettable- tsunami of angst.

This is a list, I shall work on ticking the things off. One at a time. The reading one seems the most feasible with my looming thesis submission. Perhaps I will want to look into someones eyes again, maybe it will make me smile. Tickling counts, I shall get a friend to tickle me, I will laugh. If tickled sufficiently, my ribs will ache. One day I will walk too far, it will take me to that dream sunrise. If I go alone, the silent scream within will die. If I don't, the stars shall see our bottoms. Why am I not taking this more seriously? Maybe I should.

Flight and freedom

Things to do before you get on another persons $2000 road bike:
1) Figure out where the brakes are
2) Work out how to change gears beforehand

I have not ridden a bike in ages and somehow managed to forget that RPM/spinning does not constitute bicycling. With terrible night vision, having never cycled a type of bike that requires one to tip forward so much at the hip and being only able to graze the ground with the tips of my toes, it was a harrowing ride.

That said, it was fun and the adrenaline rush and inducement of panic jolted me out of the numbed and oxymoronic apathetic-agitation (how would one describe it, being throughly agitated without really giving a shit about anything or being able to localize the source of the panic? There must be a more concise and elegant way of putting this but it escapes me right now). The emptiness of the bike path, the quiet whirring of the bicycle, the lake quiescent but nature whizzing by, and the wind whipping your hair into a tangled frenzy.

I would do it again. With a better fitted helmet. In the daytime -until marginally familiar with the paths. I would have stood and cycled, harder, faster, if there wasn't anyone else with me, maybe that is how things are, only alone can one be free. Maybe, hopefully, someday it will be possible to learn to express myself completely, freely, with at least one other person.

This has been a year of new experiences. Realizing when giving up was not actually a bad thing. Learning to move on. Trying things I have never done. Taking on more responsibilities, the myriad causes that mean so much to other groups. They might not be my personal fight, but if it will make the world more just, why should I not stand with them and speak out against bigotry and injustice? My goal for the year, three months in, is to live. To really live, to try as many things as I can. To read as widely but more deeply. To overreach and take risks I wouldn't normally attempt. To take ownership of my life and never pick the default road unless it is the best possible option. 

Unrooted.

My parents often complain that I lack a sense of "rootedness" or being stable. It's not so much that I'm not yet financially independent but more that there is little anchoring to me any one place. I thought a person could do that, maybe it could still happen, who knows? In any case, the crossroad is looming and many decisions remain unmade. What to do next is sort of figured out but where, not so much. It's amazing but confusing when the world is open to you. Then the practicalities sink in, what does one do for funding? It is so much tougher for international students everywhere, unless your country funds you. I laugh at that notion, mine never has and never would. Such a disadvantage, why would I subject my progeny to that?! That rant is overdone but it's difficult to shake off close to a decade of disappointment and annoyance at the injustice of it all.


Today however, I viewed the crossroad positively for the first time. Laremy posted an article on how most lives are lived by default (http://www.raptitude.com/2012/07/most-lives-are-lived-by-default/). While I may lack anchoring, default has almost never been the option taken.

The aftermath.

I should be thankful for the messages of concern and offering counsel. Instead it feels intrusive and like my decisions are being questioned.

An excerpt of a sincere and well-meaning message:

Hey Eva,
I am just concern about your decision to call off the engagement and move on. Perhaps you can give me a time slot that we can meet for a cup of coffee and talk about life.
It's a difficult decision for you but there's a story behind every phase.

My unfortunate response:

Thank you but I don't really believe it's your concern.

I did not mean to come across as bitchy, but this is not someone I'd count as a close friend. They have less facts on the matter than me, why would they think that their opinion would count for something? Well, such should be expected when one chooses to disclose such information on so public a forum. It was changed initially to give him peace and now must be changed to give everyone else closure. Lesson learned.

Close friends did not bother with questions as they know me well enough to be aware of how I deliberate and err on the side of being  over-cautious, all they offered was a listening ear if ever required. I don't pull plugs for fun and to be fair, the average person would not have known my unhappiness. I've always worn my masks well.

Et après

Oddly enough,
I am happy still, possibly more so.
That has to be a good sign.

The straw that broke the camels back.

I am angry. Because the safety or your car was more important than my emotional well being. Because you will not stand up for me. Because you made me believe that you do not think my right to education is equal. Because in your head it is okay for me to give up everything I stand for and return to nothing at all, not even care and security. Because you could shift if you really cared about the proximity. Because you said you would but won't. Because I have a promise to keep to my 17 year old self. Because I owe it to my children to raise them in a place that will not teach them that their rights are less than anothers. Because I have so much to give and it shall all go to naught. Because they could have so much to give and that to would amount to nothing.

The trigger was small, the reaction disproportionate. The result of pent-up angst and a deeper frustration of the injustice of it all. I love my country, I want to go back, it doesn't want me or what I could offer. In the land of our birth, me and mine, you and yours, will all be second class citizens. Is it so wrong that I'm avoiding it for as long as possible? 

Looking ahead

2012 was probably one of the worst and also best years of my life. Looking back, it's amazing how unscathed I appear to be in the end. The realities of some of the worst things and the decisions I've made will haunt me for life and some days will always be worse than others but overall I've come out feeling more positive about most aspects of my life.
From an academics perspective, it was a pretty good year. The break begun with no pending deadlines and the performance overall decent. During the year, research and publishing opportunities arose, the latter will need to be followed up but is nonetheless heartening. Summer in Copenhagen was excellent and a rewarding experience. Grades good, work enjoyable. All in all satisfactory.
On the relationship side of things, the converse is probably true. It was a difficult, difficult year. Long distance is really the main issue and an exacerbating factor is that the time is stretching on rather than ending as quickly as anticipated. We should be near the end of the 'time apart' period but my ambitions mean that Malaysia is not the best option right now and his job means that leaving Malaysia at this juncture would be difficult. Urgh! The bickering is constant, our ideas on what to do next diverge greatly but we don't want to not be together, at least I don't... We've been through some very trying times and we're still holding it together. There are marriages that haven't survived some of what we've had to weather (apart from the distance even) and we're still doing it. Maybe it's not the right way to think but it just serves to give me more hope that things will work out in the end. Don't know lah.
Upon returning, there is always a sense of emptiness. I miss my family, the cat and dog, good and cheap food, friends etc. It is not an easy decision to leave all that I have in that part of the world to be alone on a vast island, so far from people I trust and love. What keeps me going is the need to see my dreams through to the end. In a few days, maybe weeks, things will start to feel less alien again. Plunging into work, the postgrad union activities and hall stuff will keep me from feeling the doldrums. Activity is necessary to fulfill and most of all to forget.